This is one of the great guns of the Arminians,
mounted upon the top of their walls, and often discharged with terrible
noise against the poor Christians called Calvinists. I intend to spike
the gun this morning, or, rather, to turn it on the enemy, for it was never
theirs; it was never cast at their foundry at all, but was intended to
teach the very opposite doctrine to that which they assert.

Usually, when the text is taken, the divisions
are: First, that man has a will. Secondly, that he is entirely free. Thirdly,
that men must make themselves willing to come to Christ, otherwise they
will not be saved. Now, we shall have no such divisions; but we will endeavor
to take a more calm look at the text; and not, because there happen to
be the words "will," or "will not" in it, run away with the conclusion
that it teaches the doctrine of free- will.

It has already been proved beyond all controversy
that free-will is nonsense. Freedom cannot belong to will any more than
ponderability can belong to electricity. They are altogether different
things. Free agency we may believe in, but free- will is simply ridiculous.
The will is well known by all to be directed by the understanding, to be
moved by motives, to be guided by other parts of the soul, and to be a
secondary thing.

Philosophy and religion both discard at once
the very thought of free-will; and I will go as far as Martin Luther, in
that strong assertion of his, where he says, "If any man doth ascribe aught
of salvation, even the very least, to the free-will of man, he knoweth
nothing of grace, and he hath not learnt Jesus Christ aright." It may seem
a harsh sentiment; but he who in his soul believes that man does of his
own free-will turn to God, cannot have been taught of God, for that is
one of the first principles taught us when God begins with us, that we
have neither will nor power, but that he gives both; that he is "Alpha
and Omega" in the salvation of men.

Our four points, this morning, shall be: First--that
every man is dead, because it says: "Ye will not come to me, that ye might
have life." Secondly--that there is life in Jesus Christ: "Ye will not
come

to me, that ye might have life." Thirdly--that
there is life in Christ Jesus for every one that comes for it: "Ye will
not come to me, that ye might have life;" implying that all who go will
have life. And fourthly--the gist of the text lies here, that no man by
nature ever will come to Christ, for the text says, "Ye will not come to
me, that ye might have life." So far from asserting that men of their own
wills ever do such a thing, it boldly and flatly denies it, and says, "Ye
WILL NOT come to me, that ye might have life." Why, beloved, I am almost
ready to exclaim, Have all free-willers no knowledge that they dare to
run in the teeth of inspiration? Have all those that deny the doctrine
of grace no sense? Have they so departed from God that they wrest this
to prove free-will; whereas the text says, "Ye WILL NOT come to me that
ye might have life."

I. First, then, our text implies THAT MEN
BY NATURE ARE DEAD.

No being needs to go after life if he has
life in himself. The text speaks very strongly when it says, "Ye will not
come unto me, that ye might have life." Though it saith it not in words,
yet it doth in effect affirm that men need a life more than they have themselves.
My hearers, we are all dead unless we have been begotten unto a lively
hope.

First, we are all of us, by nature, legally
dead--"In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt die the death," said
God to Adam; and though Adam did not die in that moment naturally, he died
legally; that is to say death was recorded against him. As soon as, at
the Old Bailey, the judge puts on the black cap and pronounces the sentence,
the man is reckoned to be dead at law. Though perhaps a month may intervene
before he is brought on the scaffold to endure the sentence of the law,
yet the law looks upon him as a dead man. It is impossible for him to transact
anything. He cannot inherit, he cannot bequeath; he is nothing--he is a
dead man. The country considers him not as being alive in it at all. There
is an election--he is not asked for his vote because he is considered as
dead. He is shut up in his condemned cell, and he is dead. Ah! and ye ungodly
sinners who have never had life in Christ, ye are alive this morning, by
reprieve, but do ye know that ye are legally dead; that God considers you
as such, that in the day when your father Adam touched the fruit, and when
you yourselves did sin, God, the Eternal Judge, put on the black cap and
condemned you? You talk mightily of your own standing, and goodness, and
morality--where is it? Scripture saith, ye are "condemned already." Ye
are not to wait to be condemned at the judgment-day--that will be the execution
of the sentence--ye are "condemned already." In the moment ye sinned; your
names were all written in the black book of justice; every one was then
sentenced by God to death, unless he found a substitute, in the person
of Christ, for his sins.

What would you think if you were to go into
the Old Bailey, and see the condemned culprit sitting in his cell, laughing
and merry? You would say, "The man is a fool, for he is condemned, and
is to be executed; yet how merry he is." Ah! and how foolish is the worldly
man, who, while sentence is recorded against him, lives in merriment and
mirth! Do you think the sentence of God is of no effect? Thinkest thou
that thy sin which is written with an iron pen on the rocks for ever hath
no horrors in it? God hath said thou art condemned already. If thou wouldst
but feel this, it would mingle bitters in thy sweet cups of joy; thy dances
would be stopped, thy laughter quenched in sighing, if thou wouldst recollect
that thou art condemned already. We ought all to weep, if we lay this to
our souls: that by nature we have no life in God's sight; we are actually,
positively condemned; death is recorded against us, and we are considered
in ourselves now, in God's sight, as much dead as if we were actually cast
into hell; we are condemned here by sin, we do not yet suffer the penalty
of it, but it is written against us, and we are legally dead, nor can we
find life unless we find legal life in the person of Christ, of which more
by-and-by. But, besides being legally dead, we are also spiritually dead.
For not only did the sentence pass in the book, but it passed in the heart;
it entered the conscience; it operated on the soul, on the judgment, on
the imagination, and on everything. "In the day that thou eatest thereof
thou shalt surely die," was not only fulfilled by the sentence recorded,
but by something which took place in Adam. Just as, in a certain moment,
when this body shall die, the blood stops, the pulse ceases, the breath
no longer comes from the lungs, so in the day that Adam did eat that fruit
his soul died; his imagination lost its mighty power to climb into celestial
things and see heaven, his will lost its power always to choose that which
is good, his judgment lost all ability to judge between right and wrong
decidedly and infallibly, though something was retained in conscience;
his memory became tainted, liable to hold evil things, and let righteous
things glide away; every power of him ceased as to its oral vitality. Goodness
was the vitality of his powers--that departed. Virtue, holiness, integrity,
these were the life of man; but when these departed man became dead.

And now, every man, so far as spiritual things
are concerned, is "dead in trespasses and sins" spiritually. Nor is the
soul less dead in a carnal man, than the body is when committed to the
grave; it is actually and positively dead--not by a metaphor, for Paul
speaketh not in metaphor, when he affirms, "You hath he quickened who were
dead in trespasses and sins."

But my hearers, again, I would I could preach
to your hearts concerning this subject. It was bad enough when I described
death as having been recorded; but now I speak of it as having actually
taken place in your hearts. Ye are not what ye once were; ye are not what
ye were in Adam, not what ye were created. Man was made pure and holy.
Ye are not the perfect creatures of which some boast; ye are altogether
fallen, ye have gone out of the way, ye have become corrupt and filthy.
Oh! listen not to the siren song of those who tell you of your moral dignity,
and your mighty elevation in matters of salvation. Ye are not perfect;
that great word, "ruin," is written on your heart; and death is stamped
upon your spirit.

Do not conceive, O moral man, that thou wilt
be able to stand before God in thy morality, for thou art nothing but a
carcass embalmed in legality, a corpse arrayed in some fine robes, but
still corrupt in God's sight. And think not, O thou possessor of natural
religion! that thou mayest by thine own might and power make thyself acceptable
to God. Why, man! thou art dead! and thou mayest array the dead as gloriously
as thou pleasest, but still it would be a solemn mockery. There lieth queen
Cleopatra--put the crown upon her head, deck her in royal robes, let her
sit in state; but what a cold chill runs through you when you pass by her.
She is fair now, even in her death--but how horrible it is to stand by
the side even of a dead queen, celebrated for her majestic beauty! So you
may be glorious in your beauty, fair, and amiable, and lovely; you put
the crown of honesty upon your head, and wear about you all the garments
of uprightness, but unless God has quickened thee, O man! unless the Spirit
has had dealings with thy soul, thou art in God's sight as obnoxious as
the chilly corpse is to thyself. Thou wouldst not choose to live with a
corpse sitting at thy table; nor doth God love that thou shouldst be in
his sight. He is angry with thee every day, for thou art in sin--thou art
in death. Oh! believe this; take it to thy soul; appropriate it, for it
is most true that thou art dead, spiritually as well as legally.

The third kind of death is the consummation
of the other two. It is eternal death. It is the execution of the legal
sentence; it is the consummation of the spiritual death. Eternal death
is the death of the soul; it takes place after the body has been laid in
the grave, after the soul has departed from it. If legal death be terrible,
it is because of its consequences; and if spiritual death be dreadful,
it is because of that which shall succeed it. The two deaths of which we
have spoken are the roots, and that death which is to come is the flower
thereof.

Oh! had I words that I might this morning
attempt to depict to you what eternal death is. The soul has come before
its Maker; the book has been opened; the sentence has been uttered; "Depart
ye cursed" has shaken the universe, and made the very spheres dim with
the frown of the Creator; the soul has departed to the depths where it
is to dwell with others in eternal death. Oh! how horrible is its position
now. Its bed is a bed of flame; the sights it sees are murdering ones that
affright its spirit; the sounds it hears are shrieks, and wails, and moans,
and groans; all that its body knows is the infliction of miserable pain!
It has the possession of unutterable woe, of unmitigated misery. The soul
looks up. Hope is extinct--it is gone. It looks downward in dread and fear;
remorse hath possessed its soul. It looks on the right hand--and the adamantine
walls of fate keep it within its limits of torture. It looks on the left--and
there the rampart of blazing fire forbids the scaling ladder of e'en a
dreamy speculation of escape. It looks within and seeks for consolation
there, but a gnawing worm hath entered into the soul. It looks about it--it
has no friends to aid, no comforters, but tormentors in abundance. It knoweth
nought of hope of deliverance; it hath heard the everlasting key of destiny
turning in its awful wards, and it hath seen God take that key and hurl
it down into the depth of eternity never to be found again. It hopeth not;
it knoweth no escape; it guesseth not of deliverance; it pants for death,
but death is too much its foe to be there; it longs that non-existence
would swallow it up, but this eternal death is worse than annihilation.
It pants for extermination as the laborer for his Sabbath; it longs that
it might be swallowed up in nothingness just as would the galley slave
long for freedom, but it cometh not--it is eternally dead. When eternity
shall have rolled round multitudes of its everlasting cycles it shall still
be dead. Forever knoweth no end; eternity cannot be spelled except in eternity.
Still the soul seeth written o'er its head, "Thou art damned forever."
It heareth howlings that are to be perpetual; it seeth flames which are
unquenchable; it knoweth pains that are unmitigated; it hears a sentence
that rolls not like the thunder of earth which soon is hushed--but onward,
onward, onward, shaking the echoes of eternity--making thousands of years
shake again with the horrid thunder of its dreadful sound-- "Depart! depart!
depart! ye cursed!" This is the eternal death.

II. Secondly, IN CHRIST JESUS THERE IS LIFE,

for he says: "Ye will not come to me that
ye might have life." There is no life in God the Father for a sinner; there
is no life in God the Spirit for a sinner apart from Jesus. The life of
a sinner is in Christ. If you take the Father apart from the Son, though
he loves his elect, and decrees that they shall live, yet life is only
in his Son. If you take God the Spirit apart from Jesus Christ, though
it is the Spirit that gives us spiritual life, yet it is life in Christ,
life in the Son. We dare not, and cannot apply in the first place, either
to God the Father, or to God the Holy Ghost for spiritual life. The first
thing we are led to do when God brings us out of Egypt is to eat the Passover--the
very first thing. The first means whereby we get life is by feeding upon
the flesh and blood of the Son of God; living in him, trusting on him,
believing in his grace and power.

Our second thought was--there is life in Christ.
We will show you there are three kinds of life in Christ, as there are
three kinds of death.

First there is legal life in Christ. Just
as every man by nature considered in Adam had a sentence of condemnation
passed on him in the moment of Adam's sin, and more especially in the moment
of his own first transgression, so I, if I be a believer, and you, if you
trust in Christ, have had a legal sentence of acquittal passed on us through
what Jesus Christ has done. O condemned sinner! Thou mayest be sitting
this morning condemned like the prisoner in Newgate; but ere this day has
passed away thou mayest be as clear from guilt as the angels above. There
is such a thing as legal life in Christ, and, blessed be God! some of us
enjoy it. We know our sins are pardoned because Christ suffered punishment
for them; we know that we never can be punished ourselves, for Christ suffered
in our stead. The Passover is slain for us; the lintel and door-post have
been sprinkled, and the destroying angel can never touch us. For us there
is no hell, although it blaze with terrible flame. Let Tophet be prepared
of old, let its pile be wood and much smoke, we never can come there--Christ
died for us, in our stead. What if there be racks of horrid torture? What
if there be a sentence producing most horrible reverberations of thundering
sounds? Yet neither rack, nor dungeon, nor thunder, are for us! In Christ
Jesus we are now delivered. "There is therefore NOW no condemnation unto
us who are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the
Spirit."

Sinner! Art thou legally condemned this morning?
Dost thou feel that? Then, let me tell thee that faith in Christ will give
thee a knowledge of thy legal acquittal. Beloved, it is no fancy that we
are condemned for our sins, it is a reality. So, it is no fancy we are
acquitted, it is a reality. A man about to be hanged, if he received a
full pardon would feel it a great reality. He would say, "I have a full
pardon; I cannot be touched now." That is just how I feel.

Brethren, we have gained legal life in Christ,
and such legal life that we cannot lose it. The sentence has gone against
us once--now it has gone out for us. It is written, "THERE IS NOW NO CONDEMNATION,"
and that now will do as well for me in fifty years as it does now. Whatever
time we live it will still be written, "There is therefore, now no condemnation
to them that are in Christ Jesus."

Then, secondly, there is spiritual life in
Christ Jesus. As the man is spiritually dead, God has spiritual life for
him, for there is not a need which is not supplied by Jesus, there is not
an emptiness in the heart which Christ cannot fill; there is not a desolation
which he cannot people, there is not a desert which he cannot make to blossom
as the rose. O ye dead sinners! spiritually dead, there is life in Christ
Jesus, for we have seen--yes! these eyes have seen--the dead live again;
we have known the man whose soul was utterly corrupt, by the power of God
seek after righteousness; we have known the man whose views were carnal,
whose lusts were mighty, whose passions were strong, suddenly, by irresistible
might from heaven, consecrate himself to Christ, and become a child of
Jesus. We know that there is life in Christ Jesus, of a spiritual order;
yea, more, we ourselves, in our own persons, have felt that there is spiritual
life. Well can we remember when we sat in the house of prayer, as dead
as the very seat on which we sat. We had listened for a long, long while
to the sound of the gospel, but no effect followed, when suddenly, as if
our ears had been opened by the fingers of some mighty angel, a sound entered
into our heart. We thought we heard Jesus saying, "He that hath ears to
hear, let him hear." An irresistible hand put itself on our heart and crushed
a prayer out of it. We never had a prayer before like that. We cried, "O
God! have mercy upon me a sinner."

Some of us for months felt a hand pressing
us as if we had been grasped in a vice, and our souls bled drops of anguish.
That misery was a sign of coming life. Persons when they are being drowned
do not feel the pain so much as while they are being restored. Oh! we recollect
those pains, those groans, that living strife that our soul had when it
came to Christ. Ah! we can recollect the giving of our spiritual life as
easily as could a man his restoration from the grave. We can suppose Lazarus
to have remembered his resurrection, though not all the circumstances of
it. So we, although we have forgotten a great deal, do recollect our giving
ourselves to Christ. We can say to every sinner, however dead, there is
life in Christ Jesus, though you may be rotten and corrupt in your grave.
He who hath raised Lazarus hath raised us; and he can say, even to you,
"Lazarus! come forth."

n the third place, there is eternal life in
Christ Jesus. And, oh! if eternal death be terrible, eternal life is blessed;
for he has said, "Where I am there shall my people be." "Father, I will
that they also, whom thou hast given unto me, be with me where I am, that
they ay behold my glory." "I give unto my sheep eternal life, and they
shall never perish." Now, any Arminian that would preach from that text
must buy a pair of India rubber lips, for I am sure he would need o stretch
his mouth amazingly; he would never be able to speak the whole truth without
winding about in a most mysterious manner. Eternal life--not a life which
they are to lose, but eternal life. If I lost life in Adam I gained it
in Christ; if I lost myself for ever I find myself for ever in Jesus Christ.
Eternal life! Oh blessed thought! Our eyes will sparkle with joy and our
souls bum with ecstasy in the thought that we have eternal life. Be quenched
ye stars! let God put his finger on you--but my soul will live in bliss
and joy. Put out thine eye O sun!--but mine eye shall "see the king in
his beauty" when thine eye shall no more make the green earth laugh. And
moon, be thou turned into blood!--but my blood shall ne'er be turned to
nothingness; this spirit shall exist when thou hast ceased to be. And thou
great world! thou mayest all subside, just as a moment's foam subsides
upon the wave that bears it--but I have eternal life. O time! thou mayest
see giant mountains dead and hidden in their graves; thou mayest see the
stars like figs too ripe, falling from the tree, but thou shalt never,
never see my spirit dead.

III. This brings us to the third point: that
ETERNAL LIFE IS GIVEN TO ALL WHO COME FOR IT.

There never was a man who came to Christ for
eternal life, for legal life, for spiritual life, who had not already received
it, in some sense, and it was manifested to him that he had received it
soon after he came. Let us take one or two texts--"He is able to save to
the uttermost them that come unto him." Every man who comes to Christ will
find that Christ is able to save him--not able to save him a little, to
deliver him from a little sin, to keep him from a little trial, to carry
him a little way and then drop him--but able to save him to the uttermost
extent of his sin, unto the uttermost length of his trials, he uttermost
depths of his sorrows, unto the uttermost duration of his existence. Christ
says to every one who comes to him, "Come, poor sinner, thou needst not
ask whether I have power to save. I will not ask thee how far thou hast
gone into sin; I am able to save thee to the uttermost." And there is no
one on earth can go beyond God's "uttermost."

Now another text: "Him that cometh to me,
[mark the promises are nearly always to the coming ones] I will in no wise
cast out." Every man that comes shall find the door of Christ's house opened--and
the door of his heart too. Every man that comes--I say it in the broadest
sense--shall find that Christ has mercy for him. The greatest absurdity
in the world is to want to have a wider gospel than that recorded in Scripture.
I preach that every man who believes shall be saved--that every man who
comes shall find mercy. People ask me, "But suppose a man should come who
was not chosen, would he be saved?" You go and suppose nonsense and I am
not going to give you an answer. If a man is not chosen he will never come.
When he does come it is a sure proof that he was chosen. Says one, "Suppose
any one should go to Christ who had not been called of the Spirit." Stop,
my brother, that is a supposition thou hast no right to make, for such
a thing cannot happen; you only say it to entangle me, and you will not
do that just yet. I say every man who comes to Christ shall be saved. I
can say that as a Calvinist, or as a hyper-Calvinist, as plainly as you
can say it. I have no narrower gospel than you have; only my gospel is
on a solid foundation, whereas yours is built upon nothing but sand and
rottenness. "Every man that cometh shall be saved, for no man cometh to
me except the Father draw him."

"But," says one, "suppose all the world should
come, would Christ receive them?" Certainly, if all came; but then they
won't come. I tell you all that come--aye, if they were as bad as devils,
Christ would receive them; if they had all sin and filthiness running into
their hearts as into a common sewer for the whole world, Christ would receive
them.

Another says, "I want to know about the rest
of the people. May I go out and tell them--Jesus Christ died for every
one of you? May I say--there is righteousness for everyone of you, there
is life for every one of you?" No; you may not. You may say--there is life
for every man that comes. But if you say there is life for one of those
that do not believe, you utter a dangerous lie. If you tell them Jesus
Christ was punished for their sins, and yet they will be lost, you tell
a willful falsehood. To think that God could punish Christ and then punish
them--I wonder at your daring to have the impudence to say so! A good man
was once preaching that there were harps and crowns in heaven for all his
congregation; and then he wound up in a most solemn manner: "My dear friends,
there are many for whom these things are prepared who will not get there."
In fact, he made such a pitiful tale, as indeed he might do; but I tell
you who he ought to have wept for--he ought to have wept for the angels
of heaven and all the saints, because that would spoil heaven thoroughly.

You know when you meet at Christmas, if you
have lost your brother David and his seat is empty, you say: "Well, we
always enjoyed Christmas, but there is a drawback to it now-- poor David
is dead and buried!" Think of the angels saying: "Ah! this is a beautiful
heaven, but we don't like to see all those crowns up there with cobwebs
on; we cannot endure that uninhabited street: we cannot behold yon empty
thrones." And then, poor souls, they might begin talking to one another,
and say, "we are none of us safe here for the promise was--"I give unto
my sheep eternal life," and there is a lot of them in hell that God gave
eternal life to; there is a number that Christ shed his blood for burning
in the pit, and if they may be sent there, so may we. If we cannot trust
one promise we cannot another." So heaven would lose its foundation, and
fall. Away with your nonsensical gospel! God gives us a safe and solid
one, built on covenant doings and covenant relationship, on eternal purposes
and sure fulfillments.

IV. This brings us to the fourth point, THAT
BY NATURE NO MAN WILL COME TO CHRIST,

for the text says, "Ye will not come to me,
that ye might have life." I assert on Scripture authority from my text,
that ye will not come unto Christ, that ye might have life. I tell you,
I might preach to you for ever, I might borrow the eloquence of Demosthenes
or of Cicero, but ye will not come unto Christ. I might beg of you on my
knees, with tears in my eyes, and show you the horrors of hell and the
joys of heaven, the sufficiency of Christ, and your own lost condition,
but you would none of you come unto Christ of yourselves unless the Spirit
that rested on Christ should draw you. It is true of all men in their natural
condition that they will not come unto Christ.

But, methinks I hear another of these babblers
asking a question: "But could they not come if they liked?" My friend,
I will reply to thee another time. That is not the question this morning.
I am talking about whether they will, not whether they can. You will notice
whenever you talk about free- will, the poor Arminian, in two seconds begins
to talk about power, and he mixes up two subjects that should be kept apart.
We will not take two subjects at once; we decline fighting two at the same
time, if you please. Another day we will preach from this text--"No man
can come except the Father draw him." But it is only the will we are talking
of now; and it is certain that men will not come unto Christ, that they
might have life. We might prove this from many texts of Scripture, but
we will take one parable. You remember the parable where a certain king
had a feast for his son, and bade a great number to come; the oxen and
fatlings were killed, and he sent his messengers bidding many to the supper.
Did they go to the feast? Ah, no; but they all, with one accord, began
to make excuse. One said he had married a wife, and therefore he could
not come, whereas he might have brought her with him. Another had bought
a yoke of oxen, and went to prove them; but the feast was in the night-time,
and he could not prove his oxen in the dark. Another had bought a piece
of land, and wanted to see it; but I should not think he went to see it
with a lantern. So they all made excuses and would not come. Well the king
was determined to have the feast; so he said, "Go out into the highways
and hedges, and" invite them--stop! not invite--"compel them to come in;"
for even the ragged fellows in the hedges would never have come unless
they were compelled.

Take another parable: A certain man had a
vineyard; at the appointed season he sent one of his servants for his rent.
What did they do to him? They beat that servant. He sent another; and they
stoned him. He sent another and they killed him. And, at last, he said,
"I will send them my son, they will reverence him." But what did they do?
They said, "This is the heir, let us kill him, and cast him out of the
vineyard." So they did. It is the same with all men by nature. The Son
of God came, yet men rejected him. "Ye will not come to me that ye might
have life."

It would take too much time to mention any
more Scripture proofs. We will, however, refer to the great doctrine of
the fall. Any one who believes that man's will is entirely free, and that
he can be saved by it, does not believe the fall. As I sometimes tell you,
few preachers of religion do believe thoroughly the doctrine of the fall,
or else they think that when Adam fell down he broke his little finger,
and did not break his neck and ruin his race. Why, beloved, the fall broke
man up entirely. It did not leave one power unimpaired; they were all shattered,
and debased, and tarnished; like some mighty temple, the pillars might
be there, the shaft, and the column, and the pilaster might be there; but
they were all broken, though some of them retain their form and position.
The conscience of man sometimes retains much of its tenderness--still it
has fallen. The will, too, is not exempt. What though it is "the Lord Mayor
of Mansoul," as Bunyan calls it?--the Lord Mayor goes wrong. The Lord Will-be-will
was continually doing wrong.

Your fallen nature was put out of order; your
will, amongst other things, has clean gone astray from God. But I tell
you what will be the best proof of that; it is the great fact that you
never did meet a Christian in your life who ever said he came to Christ
without Christ coming to him.

You have heard a great many Arminian sermons,
I dare say; but you never heard an Arminian prayer--for the saints in prayer
appear as one in word, and deed and mind. An Arminian on his knees would
pray desperately like a Calvinist. He cannot pray about free-will: there
is no room for it. Fancy him praying, "Lord, I thank thee I am not like
those poor presumptuous Calvinists. Lord, I was born with a glorious free-will;
I was born with power by which I can turn to thee of myself; I have improved
my grace. If everybody had done the same with their grace that I have,
they might all have been saved. Lord, I know thou dost not make us willing
if we are not willing ourselves. Thou givest grace to everybody; some do
not improve it, but I do. There are many that will go to hell as much bought
with the blood of Christ as I was; they had as much of the Holy Ghost given
to them; they had as good a chance, and were as much blessed as I am. It
was not thy grace that made us to differ; I know it did a great deal, still
I turned the point; I made use of what was given me, and others did not--
that is the difference between me and them."

That is a prayer for the devil, for nobody
else would offer such a prayer as that. Ah! when they are preaching and
talking very slowly, there may be wrong doctrine; but when they come to
pray, the true thing slips out; they cannot help it. If a man talks very
slowly, he may speak in a fine manner; but when he comes to talk fast,
the old brogue of his country, where he was born, slips out.

I ask you again, did you ever meet a Christian
man who said, "I came to Christ without the power of the Spirit?" If you
ever did meet such a man, you need have no hesitation in saying, "My dear
sir, I quite believe it--and I believe you went away again without the
power of the Spirit, and that you know nothing about the matter, and are
in the gall of bitterness and the bond of iniquity." Do I hear one Christian
man saying, "I sought Jesus before he sought me; I went to the Spirit,
and the Spirit did not come to me"? No, beloved; we are obliged, each one
of us, to put our hands to our hearts and say-

"Grace taught my soul to pray,And made my eyes to o'erflow;'Twas grace that kept me to this day,And will not let me go."

Is there one here--a solitary one-- man or
woman, young or old, who can say, "I sought God before he sought me?" No;
even you who are a little Arminian, will sing--

"O yes! I do love Jesus--Because he first loved me."

Then, one more question. Do we not find, even
after we have come to Christ, our soul is not free, but is kept by Christ?
Do we not find times, even now, when to will is not present with us? There
is a law in our members, warring against the law of our minds. Now, if
those who are spiritually alive feel that their will is contrary to God,
what shall we say of the man who is "dead in trespasses and sins"? It would
be a marvelous absurdity to put the two on a level; and it would be still
more absurd to put the dead before the living. No; the text is true, experience
has branded it into our hearts. "Ye will not come to me, that ye might
have life."

Now, we must tell you the reasons why men
will not come unto Christ. The first is, because no man by nature thinks
he wants Christ. By nature man conceives that he does not need Christ;
he thinks that he has a robe of righteousness of his own, that he is well-dressed,
that he is not naked, that he needs not Christ's blood to wash him, that
he is not black or crimson, and needs no grace to purify him. No man knows
his need until God shows it to him; and until the Holy Spirit reveals the
necessity of pardon, no man will seek pardon. I may preach Christ for ever,
but unless you feel you want Christ you will never come to him. A doctor
may have a good shop, but nobody will buy his medicines until he feels
he wants them.

The next reason is, because men do not like
Christ's way of saving them. One says, "I do not like it because he makes
me holy; I cannot drink or swear if he saved me." Another says, "It requires
me to be so precise and puritanical, and I like a little more license."
Another does not like it because it is so humbling; he does not like it
because the "gate of heaven" is not quite high enough for his head, and
he does not like stooping. That is the chief reason ye will not come to
Christ, because ye cannot get to him with your heads straight up in the
air; for Christ makes you stoop when you come. Another does not like it
to be grace from first to last. "Oh!" he says, "If I might have a little
honor." But when he hears it is all Christ or no Christ, a whole Christ
or no Christ, he says, "I shall not come," and turns on his heel and goes
away. Ah! proud sinners, ye will not come unto Christ. Ah! ignorant sinners,
ye will not come unto Christ, because ye know nothing of him. And that
is the third reason.

Men do not know his worth, for if they did
they would come unto him. Why did not sailors go to America before Columbus
went? Because they did not believe there was an America. Columbus had faith,
therefore he went. He who hath faith in Christ goes to him. But you don't
know Jesus; many of you never saw his beauteous face; you never saw how
applicable his blood is to a sinner, how great is his atonement; and how
all-sufficient are his merits. Therefore, "ye will not come to him."

And oh! my hearers, my last thought is a solemn
one. I have preached that ye will not come. But some will say, "it is their
sin that they do not come." IT IS SO. You will not come, but then your
will is a sinful will. Some think that we "sew pillows to all armholes"
when we preach this doctrine, but we don't. We do not set this down as
being part of man's original nature, but as belonging to his fallen nature.
It is sin that has brought you into this condition that you will not come.
If you had not fallen, you would come to Christ the moment he was preached
to you; but you do not come because of your sinfulness and crime. People
excuse themselves because they have bad hearts. That is the most flimsy
excuse in the world. Do not robbery and thieving come from a bad heart?
Suppose a thief should say to a judge, "I could not help it, I had a bad
heart." What would the judge say? "You rascal! why, if your heart is bad,
I'll make the sentence heavier, for you are a villain indeed. Your excuse
is nothing." The Almighty shall "laugh at them, and shall have them in
derision." We do not preach this doctrine to excuse you, but to humble
you. The possession of a bad nature is my fault as well as my terrible
calamity. It is a sin that will always be charged on men; when they will
not come unto Christ it is sin that keeps them away. He who does not preach
that, I fear is not faithful to God and his conscience. Go home, then,
with this thought; "I am by nature so perverse that I will not come unto
Christ, and that wicked perversity of my nature is my sin. I deserve to
be sent to hell for it." And if the thought does not humble you, the Spirit
using it, no other can. This morning I have not preached human nature up,
but I have preached it down. God humble us all. Amen.